From Greg de Paco, New Westminster, British Columbia

“George Monbiot is correct that if a transportation system were designed today with the objective of moving people around efficiently it would not focus on the private automobile. In North America our transportation systems were not designed for efficient movement but for auto industry profit.

“The car companies bought up the street car systems of almost every North American city – Toronto and San Francisco alone successfully resisted – in order to tear up the rails and create a market for their product. This eventually resulted in an anti- trust conviction – and a fine of a single dollar.”